Chris Van Hollen: “I want to start my remarks today by focusing on a serious threat to our national security, and that is North Korea's…”

“I want to start my remarks today by focusing on a serious threat to our national security, and that is North Korea's nuclear program--both its nuclear weapons program as well as its missile program. At this moment the United States must exert maximum economic pressure to get North Korea to engage in meaningful discussions with the goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula. That is why Senator Toomey and I introduced the BRINK Act. I was pleased to see the changing of the guard here at the desk, with the Senator from Pennsylvania having just been the Presiding Officer and the Senator from Colorado taking over, because I know the Senator from Colorado has also been very deeply involved in this issue to try to make sure that we address the threat of the North Korea program. The BRINK Act is bipartisan legislation passed unanimously out of the Banking Committee back on November 7. It imposes very tough sanctions on North Korea, and, just as importantly, it has enforcement mechanisms to make sure financial institutions anywhere in the world that are not cooperating with the United States and our allies to impose those sanctions on North Korea are penalized. It is a very simple message: You can do business with North Korea or you can do business with the United States. You cannot do business with both.…”